NIST's high-tech surplus brings 7 percent budget cut

MARCH 10'The National Institute of Standards and Technology agreed at a House Science subcommittee hearing Thursday to lower its fiscal 2001 budget request by $12.8 million.

NIST director Raymond Kammer, questioned by the Technology Subcommittee's vice chairman, Rep. Gil Gutknecht (R-Minn.), said the institute had asked in its fiscal 2001 budget request for more money than it needed.

The Commerce Department's Advanced Technology Program had a $12.8 million surplus for fiscal 1999, Gutknecht said. The technology program, which promotes high-tech research partnerships with industry, "will now have to adjust its fiscal 2001 request downward by $12.8 million," he said. That will reduce NIST's total budget request to $162.7 million from $175.5 million.